Mikel Arteta, success or failure? - Merged thread.

[NickF]

Arteta is where we are. It doesn’t matter who came in to manage us, NO-ONE could get such a poor defence playing well, it simply isn’t possible. Our midfield is diabolical and makes the defence look even worse! People need to accept this, seriously!!

The problem is not just the defence, it is what the WHOLE team does when we haven't got the ball.

You could replace all 4 defenders (which we actually have - Bellerin, Tierney out and we bought another defender whose name escapes me but is out on loan) and it wouldn't make a difference if the rest of the team don't help out.

Yesterday in the first half even Aubameyang was putting in tackles around our penalty area..

[Clash]

I argued for a long time that the players were fcuking emery over, and ultimately it was them that got him sacked. You knew that they had downed tools in a bid to get him fired, and I am shocked that the players have been given a free pass for their unacceptable application and attitudes (not to mention performances) by a massive percentage of the fanbase. A large percentage of the fans had turned against emery and felt (and many still feel) that he was the problem, when the reality was that he was only a part of the problem. I understand why fans wanted a change of manager and then hoped for the bounce teams get under a new manager, but there is a difference between optimism and blind optimism, and reality should be kicking in by then. A load of sanctimonious fans are now having a pop at other fans question and criticizing arteta, but that is a little hypocritical imo - there is a reason why arteta received ZERO votes in the poll on here for choice of next manager, but now we are all supposed to believe that he is the right man for the job ? If these fans felt he was the right appointment, then why didnt they vote for him in the poll ? We needed an experienced manager to guide us out of the shit we are in - we needed a pragmatic manager willing to adapt to what he is dealing with, but instead we got a principled manager who believes that football should be played the right way (a mini wenger ) and who has ZERO experience as a manager.

This isnt about slating arteta who might turn out in a few years time to be a good manager - this is about a sense of realism where draws away to a struggling/shit bournemouth team are not taken as a reason for positivity simple cos of a managerial change.

Agree with all of this. Well said Augie

I can only speak for myself but during the debate about who our next manager should be, I suddenly came to the conclusion that it was irrelevant in many ways because there was nobody that could come in and make this set of players into a good side. And that's because they are not a good set of players.

Saying that, after Emery was sacked, there was a sensible route we could have gone down and there was a risky route. Ancelotti was the sensible choice, Arteta was the risk. In my opinion we are NOT in a position to be taking risks but we have done just that by appointing a rookie manager.

Yesterday we saw what a difference even 1 season of experience as a manager can make with the way Lampard changed things around during the game. Arteta made a difference to our game initially but only in the first half. His naivety showed when he stuck with it while the opponents changed their system.

Its all very well talking the big talk about not worrying too much about the opposition but the players we have are not a good enough to just play the way we want to play. Arteta will need to learn quickly that we will need to adapt our game more than he would like to. At least with the players available to him right now.

None of us know how things will turn out but I think Arteta will probably become a good manager. I am not convinced Arsenal will benefit from it too much though. I fear that when he looks back on his managerial career one day, he will say that his time at Arsenal taught him a lot but that he had to learn things the hard way here. And so although that helped him develop as a coach, it was not good for us as a club.

I still do not see a brighter future. A massive clear out is STILL needed but the problem is the people responsible for doing that also need to go. And some of them (players and staff) have only just come to the club.

I hope the Arteta gamble pays off but I have to say I do not think it deserves to pay off. There is a time and place for taking a gamble and this was not that time.

[clockender1]

Arteta is where we are. It doesn’t matter who came in to manage us, NO-ONE could get such a poor defence playing well, it simply isn’t possible. Our midfield is diabolical and makes the defence look even worse! People need to accept this, seriously!!

The problem is not just the defence, it is what the WHOLE team does when we haven't got the ball.

You could replace all 4 defenders (which we actually have - Bellerin, Tierney out and we bought another defender whose name escapes me but is out on loan) and it wouldn't make a difference if the rest of the team don't help out.

Yesterday in the first half even Aubameyang was putting in tackles around our penalty area..

Saliba ?

We are viewing this over a very short window, but based on yesterday, i think tets will be a relative success.

For 70 minutes yesterday the players were actually trying until they ran out of stamina - luiz looked focused, torreira and auba worked their arses off, and our back four were finally just hoofing it when they needed to.

Despite the loss, the commentators and pundits superlatives were all for us in the first half. Lets not forget that.

I think we were one Chambers injury from stuffing the chavs 2 or 3-0.

The whole club does need an overhaul, and he will be hamstrung by the board, but i think he'll do okay - top six this year and top four the next.

[augie]

I understand the thought process where some fans believe that arteta was schooled yesterday by lumpolard, but I don't necessarily agree with that - fat frank came out on top yesterday cos he had a jorginho on the bench to bring on, but we had no-one of that quality on our bench. I get where people say that arteta should have made subs earlier cos there were players out on their feet for a long time, but I would counter that by saying that bringing in fresh legs Willock made absolutely no difference to us whatsoever, so bringing him on earlier might not have improved things either. The whole fresh legs policy only works when those fresh legs go flat out when they are brought on, but bringing on lazy subs like Willock and pepe (neither of which will do the hard work for the team) showed the sparsity of options on our bench and changing for changing's sake is pointless imo

[Eboue-Why?]

Lot of negativity on here towards Arteta. Sad really. He knows as well as any of us how Poor our Squad is, he cannot say publicly there are at least 7 players in out first squad that he would kick out now if he could, he is having to make pearls out of a swines ear or whatever the effing saying is.

Ancelloti couldn't do any better with the shyte Arteta has at his disposal to play.

Like it or not this is going to be a long, loooooong hard road, not even Jesus H, Buddha, Allah or any other fuckerr could change this around in a few weeks, which is what some seem to be calling for.

Arteta knows only too well the challenge he has taken on, he knows far more about football etc that any of us on here so FFS get behind him and the team (as much as we may not like a number of players) and give him a chance.

Well said mate

[GoonerMuzz]

What I dont get is why people think Ancellotti didnt just tell us to get to fuck after he was spoken to. Maybe Arteta was given the job because no other manager who was asked was willing to work under the restraints imposed on him. We'll never know.

Ancellotti is a massively experienced Manager, I'd say vastly more experienced in footballing terms and what is required to turn this squad around than any of the chumps in our board room.

We do not have this divine right to expect any Manager who is offered the job to accept it, maybe 10 years ago but definitely not now. Yes we're a big club with a storied history but anyone with any footballing understanding can see from the outside we are going the wrong direction and have been for quite a few years now. It's entirely possible that Everton were offering things that our club weren't willing to and Ancellotti chose them for exactly that reason.

We got Arteta, he is likely to fail but this navel gazing about what could/should have been is getting nauseating. If you dont want to support the manager I understand that, his appointment was something none of us wanted, but dont act like you know more than the rest of us and are more right than those of us who are willing to give him a chance, that in itself is being sanctimonious to say the least.

[falkirk goon]

After manure we have
6 jan Leeds H cup depends what side Leeds play..
11 jan Palace A draw at best
18 jan Sheff U H draw at best
21 jan Chavs A loss
25 jan Cup tie if we manage past Leeds read above
2 feb Boornleh A draw at best

3 aways in the league and a game at home to sheff u who have lost only 1 away game this season..cant see us winning any of these either

[Sutch2]

The whole club does need an overhaul, and he will be hamstrung by the board, but i think he'll do okay - top six this year and top four the next.

Top six this year? I have us finishing somewhere between 11th and 15th. Despite the improvement yesterday, I still can't see us winning any of our upcoming games except possibly Man Utd, and we may well get fucked on the break again in that game if Mustafi plays. Whoever scouted him should be sacked. We've had quite a few games at home which we've drawn or lost, so we still have to go away to those sides except Bournemouth. I can see us losing to every one of Palace, Brighton and the other one that I've forgotten. Not being purposefully depressing, just the reality of our truly shite squad.

I did a predictor earlier, and by the end of it we got to 42 points. If Aubameyang leaves next month, I don't even know if we'll get to that points total, especially if we replace him with that fucking no mark Volland from Leverkusen - right out of the Wenger book of replacing van Persie with Giroud, that.

Not really relevant to the thread, but I couldn't find any other thread to place it in, talking of the squad - Kolasinac is awful, yet he's always overlooked as one of the players we need to get rid of ASAP, probably because the CBs look even worse than him. I never wanted us to sign him - admittedly, I'd never seen him play, but he reeked of the typical average at best shite that Wenger so loved and all the twitter fanboys at the time were lapping it up that we'd signed him because he was in the Bundesliga TOTY. The bloke's shite. He can't defend for shit, and people say he 'makes up for it' going forward, yet he offers nothing up there either - the only thing he does is that he gets into good positions sometimes, that's all he does. Fuck knows how we sold Monreal for him. I don't care if he was on his last legs, I'd rather have a geriatric Monreal as back up to Tierney than fucking Kolasinac.

[NickF]

What I dont get is why people think Ancellotti didnt just tell us to get to fuck after he was spoken to.

You seriously believe that? I know people on here seem to hate on us and want us to fail, but our money is as good to Ancelotti as anyone. Maybe (rightly or wrongly) we wanted Arteta and didn't approach him??

[Redarmy]

I argued for a long time that the players were fcuking emery over, and ultimately it was them that got him sacked. You knew that they had downed tools in a bid to get him fired, and I am shocked that the players have been given a free pass for their unacceptable application and attitudes (not to mention performances) by a massive percentage of the fanbase. A large percentage of the fans had turned against emery and felt (and many still feel) that he was the problem, when the reality was that he was only a part of the problem. I understand why fans wanted a change of manager and then hoped for the bounce teams get under a new manager, but there is a difference between optimism and blind optimism, and reality should be kicking in by then. A load of sanctimonious fans are now having a pop at other fans question and criticizing arteta, but that is a little hypocritical imo - there is a reason why arteta received ZERO votes in the poll on here for choice of next manager, but now we are all supposed to believe that he is the right man for the job ? If these fans felt he was the right appointment, then why didnt they vote for him in the poll ? We needed an experienced manager to guide us out of the shit we are in - we needed a pragmatic manager willing to adapt to what he is dealing with, but instead we got a principled manager who believes that football should be played the right way (a mini wenger ) and who has ZERO experience as a manager.

This isnt about slating arteta who might turn out in a few years time to be a good manager - this is about a sense of realism where draws away to a struggling/shit bournemouth team are not taken as a reason for positivity simple cos of a managerial change.

Agree with all of this. Well said Augie

I can only speak for myself but during the debate about who our next manager should be, I suddenly came to the conclusion that it was irrelevant in many ways because there was nobody that could come in and make this set of players into a good side. And that's because they are not a good set of players.

Saying that, after Emery was sacked, there was a sensible route we could have gone down and there was a risky route. Ancelotti was the sensible choice, Arteta was the risk. In my opinion we are NOT in a position to be taking risks but we have done just that by appointing a rookie manager.

Yesterday we saw what a difference even 1 season of experience as a manager can make with the way Lampard changed things around during the game. Arteta made a difference to our game initially but only in the first half. His naivety showed when he stuck with it while the opponents changed their system.

Its all very well talking the big talk about not worrying too much about the opposition but the players we have are not a good enough to just play the way we want to play. Arteta will need to learn quickly that we will need to adapt our game more than he would like to. At least with the players available to him right now.

None of us know how things will turn out but I think Arteta will probably become a good manager. I am not convinced Arsenal will benefit from it too much though. I fear that when he looks back on his managerial career one day, he will say that his time at Arsenal taught him a lot but that he had to learn things the hard way here. And so although that helped him develop as a coach, it was not good for us as a club.

I still do not see a brighter future. A massive clear out is STILL needed but the problem is the people responsible for doing that also need to go. And some of them (players and staff) have only just come to the club.

I hope the Arteta gamble pays off but I have to say I do not think it deserves to pay off. There is a time and place for taking a gamble and this was not that time.

100% agree Clash....when Emery left was dreading that board making the decision, with the main factor being money
But the decision has been made, rightly or wrongly Arteta is the Arsenal manager, hes going to need the fans with him, if not consequences could be dire
think we are 2points above southampton FFS

[wibble]

What I dont get is why people think Ancellotti didnt just tell us to get to fuck after he was spoken to.

You seriously believe that? I know people on here seem to hate on us and want us to fail, but our money is as good to Ancelotti as anyone. Maybe (rightly or wrongly) we wanted Arteta and didn't approach him??

Although Everton’s money is even better for him, reported to be earning around 5m per year more than Arteta. That might have been when he told us to fuck off.
That and when he saw the two different transfer budgets I’d imagine

[Redarmy]

The excellent post titled "A note of realism" from theGooner home page really captures were we are at present

[NickF]

What I dont get is why people think Ancellotti didnt just tell us to get to fuck after he was spoken to.

You seriously believe that? I know people on here seem to hate on us and want us to fail, but our money is as good to Ancelotti as anyone. Maybe (rightly or wrongly) we wanted Arteta and didn't approach him??

Although Everton’s money is even better for him, reported to be earning around 5m per year more than Arteta. That might have been when he told us to fuck off.
That and when he saw the two different transfer budgets I’d imagine

Of course he is on more money than Arteta- he is an experienced manager. Wenger at the time was one of the highest paid managers so we're not exactly the paupers some would have us believe.

Obviously a big transfer budget helps but as Leicester and to a certain extent Wolves and Sheffield are proving it is also about getting the right players and getting the best out of them.

[Jock Gooner]

We got Arteta, he is likely to fail but this navel gazing about what could/should have been is getting nauseating. If you dont want to support the manager I understand that, his appointment was something none of us wanted, but dont act like you know more than the rest of us and are more right than those of us who are willing to give him a chance, that in itself is being sanctimonious to say the least.

Fair shout.

[Jock Gooner]

The whole club does need an overhaul, and he will be hamstrung by the board, but i think he'll do okay - top six this year and top four the next.

Not really relevant to the thread, but I couldn't find any other thread to place it in, talking of the squad - Kolasinac is awful, yet he's always overlooked as one of the players we need to get rid of ASAP, probably because the CBs look even worse than him. I never wanted us to sign him - admittedly, I'd never seen him play, but he reeked of the typical average at best shite that Wenger so loved and all the twitter fanboys at the time were lapping it up that we'd signed him because he was in the Bundesliga TOTY. The bloke's shite. He can't defend for shit, and people say he 'makes up for it' going forward, yet he offers nothing up there either - the only thing he does is that he gets into good positions sometimes, that's all he does. Fuck knows how we sold Monreal for him. I don't care if he was on his last legs, I'd rather have a geriatric Monreal as back up to Tierney than fucking Kolasinac.

Hello mate, I think if you have a scout around on some of the old match threads you'll find I am a big big fan of Kolasinac and I have no hesitation whatsoever in stating that I would have been about the first on here to call him out as a complete and utter fraud of a LB. He is indeed shit and an absolute waste of a transfer fee - cos nothing was way too much for him. I've never known a FB with his size and strength play like such a fanny. He should be maurading forward but boy does that guy like to check back to play a square or backwards ball. Clueless defending. Even Xhaka looked better than him when he covered briefly at LB last season - funnily enough another bundesliga TOTY. We pay the bloke £120k a week.....yet another fu.cking waste of money courtesy of TOF.